(CNN) - The police officer who shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice is speaking out for the first time, more than a year after the shooting.

In a signed statement given to investigators and released by the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office Tuesday, Cleveland Police Officer Timothy Loehmann doesn't mention Tamir by name.

He says he saw a suspect "pick up an object and stick it down in his waistband" as he arrived outside a Cleveland recreation center with his partner on November 22, 2014. He says he yelled "show me your hands" as loudly as he could. And he says he thought the suspect "appeared to be over 18 years old and about 185 pounds" and was pulling out a real gun.

"With his hands pulling the gun out and his elbow coming up, I knew it was a gun and it was coming out. I saw the weapon in his hands coming out of his waistband and the threat to my partner and myself was real and active," Loehmann wrote in the statement, which was dated Monday.

The officer says he fired two shots toward the gun, based on his training.

In addition to Loehmann's statement, the office of Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty released a statement from Loehmann's partner, who also says he believed the gun was real and that the person waving it was an adult.[...]In a statement accompanying the officers' accounts Tuesday, prosecutors said they were being released "in keeping with our determination to be as transparent as possible in this and other police use of fatal deadly force cases."

"The investigation is continuing," McGinty said in a statement, "and ultimately the grand jury will make its decision based on all the evidence."

A Cleveland grand jury declined Monday to bring charges in the death of Tamir Rice, a black youth with a toy gun who was shot by a white police officer 13 months ago.

"The outcome will not cheer anyone, nor should it," Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty said. He blamed the shooting on a "perfect storm" of human error and miscommunication.

The grand jury was asked to examine the actions of rookie officer Timothy Loehmann and his training officer, Frank Garmback, who responded to a report about a man with a gun near a recreation center. A dispatcher did not tell them the caller thought it was probably a child with a fake gun.

Tamir, 12, likely meant to show the officers his gun was a toy that shot plastic pellets, but there was no way the officers could have known that when they confronted him on a snowy day in November 2014, McGinty said. He said the dispatcher's failure to provide the information about the "fake gun" was key to the case.

McGinty said he agreed with the grand jury decision.

"The actions of officers Garmback and Loehmann were not criminal," McGinty said. "The evidence did not indicate criminal conduct by police."

The family of Tamir blasted McGinty in a statement, saying it was "saddened and disappointed... but not surprised" by the grand jury decision.

“It has been clear for months now that Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty was abusing and manipulating the grand jury process to orchestrate a vote against indictment,” the family said in a statement released by their lawyers. “Even though video shows the police shooting Tamir in less than one second, Prosecutor McGinty hired so-called expert witnesses to try to exonerate the officers and tell the grand jury their conduct was reasonable and justified.”

Gov. John Kasich called Tamir's death a "heartbreaking tragedy." But he urged the community not to "give in to anger and frustration and let it divide us."

The case was one in a series of police shootings nationwide that prompted Black Lives Matter protests.

Loehmann has said he ordered Tamir to show them his hands. He said Tamir reached for his waistband and that he saw a gun and fired to protect himself and Garmback. McGinty said the evidence supported Loehmann's explanation.

Protesters upset by a decision not to indict two white police officers in the shooting death of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old black boy who had a pellet gun, marched to the home of the prosecutor Friday and repeated calls for him to resign.

More than 100 people stood outside the home of Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty during the peaceful protest, which also included demands for a federal investigation into the shooting.

A march leader told protesters not to vandalize McGinty's home, which is in a neighborhood on the west side of Cleveland. Police officers accompanied the marchers and stood in McGinty's driveway but did not intervene.

The protesters chanted, "New year, no more!" and "McGinty has got to go!"

The city of Cleveland has agreed to pay $6 million to the family of a 12-year-old boy who was shot and killed by police in 2014, sparking protests over his death and the ouster of the region’s top prosecutor by voters.

The agreement released Monday in a federal court filing settles a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by the estate of Tamir Rice. As part of the settlement, the city admits no wrongdoing in the death of the African-American boy. The settlement still requires approval from probate court.

“At the end of the day, a 12-year-old child lost his life, and that should not have happened in the city of Cleveland,” Mayor Frank Jackson said at a news conference.

IMO in hindsight, they should have asked the officers to "step down", kept the $6,000,000.00 and given the officers a little bit on the side. Win-Win Mentioned in the article, there are MANY demands stated in the letter.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- An attorney for the family of Tamir Rice asked Cleveland police Chief Calvin Williams on Tuesday to announce the findings of an internal investigation into the two officers involved in the shooting death of the 12-year-old.

The letter, posted on attorney Subodh Chandra's website, demands that officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback be fired, and that the city explain why it has taken so long to announce a disciplinary decision.

Fired Officer Who Shot Tamir Rice Could Be Back at Another DepartmentBy Safia Samee Ali | NBC News | June 2, 2017

CHICAGO — The police officer who fatally shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice was fired from the Cleveland Division of Police this week, more than two years after the deadly encounter drew national attention.

The officer, Timothy Loehmann, isn't out of a job for firing several bullets into the boy, rather for giving false information on the job application that got him the position.

But the axing is not necessarily a career-ender for Loehmann, legal experts said. The state has no regulations that bind fired cops, so Loehmann — who was terminated by the department Tuesday — can be back on the job at another department.

Loehmann hid the fact that he had an "emotional breakdown" during a state qualification course, and that his former employer, the Independence Police Department, concluded he was unable "to emotionally function" in a job application for Cleveland's police force.

But this omission is not grounds for decertification in Ohio.

Under state law, an officer only loses his license if he gets convicted of a felony or pleads down to a misdemeanor from a felony, said Jill Del Greco, a spokesperson for the Ohio Peace Officer Training Commission, the state body that oversees officers in the state.

The Commission confirmed to NBC News that Loehmann has not been decertified and still carries a license to be an officer.

There is also no state requirement to report questionable acts or charges lower than a felony to the Commission, according to the law.